Kerala Homoeo Doctors Demand Govt to Relieve them from Covid Duty

Kochi: Homeo doctors are up in arms against the state government’s decision to deploy them for duty at First-Line Treatment Centres. The Kerala Government Homoeo Medical Officers’ Association (KGHMOA) has demanded the state government to immediately relieve them from Covid-19 duty and allow them to practice their form of medicine.

Recently, the state government had appointed AYUSH staff for running CFLTCs owing to shortage of hands. According to the association, as per the order issued by the government, the District Medical Officer should ensure that the human resources should be identified in such a way that the services in the respective institutions are not adversely affected.

KGHMOA state president Dr Muhammad Shafeek Masani said the operations of the majority of single-doctor homeo clinics have been affected because of the new decision. “In the order issued by the government, it is clearly written that the deployment of AYUSH resources shouldn’t affect the operations of the institution they work in.

Each homoeo clinic caters to around 50 to 100 patients daily and now because of Covid duty, these medical practitioners are forced to keep their clinic shut which is having an impact on the public depending on homeopathy medicines. It would be better if they deploy resources from clinics with multiple doctors so that it won’t affect the clinics’ normal operations,” said Muhammad Shafeek Masani.

He said that many in the state depend on homoeo medicines. “This decision is putting several patients at the receiving end,” he said. 

The association has also demanded the state government to allow homoeo doctors to give immunity-booster medicine for those under observation and the people in primary contact lists. “We have successfully cured many communicable diseases, including chikungunya and dengue in the past. We want the government to set up CFLTCs at homeopathy hospitals and allow us to treat these patients,” said Dr Shafeek Mohammad Masani. There are around 666 homoeopathy doctors at around 164 AYUSH Hospitals in the state. In addition to this, there are around 1,486 practitioners at various homoeo dispensaries in the state.

According to the association, as per the order issued by the government, the District Medical Officer should ensure that the human resources should be identified in such a way that the services in the respective institutions are not adversely affected.

Source: https://www.newindianexpress.com